GAAP Gross margin went UP to 52% in Q2 08 I think.
EDIT. Correction. GAAP gross margin went up, while non-GAAP went down.
ROFL. :laugh:
Ruiz was on the board, why would he have fired himself?
This is in part one of the "conflict of interests" that has had shareholders up in arms lately, not just at AMD but most technology companies appoint their CEO to the dual roles of CEO and member of the Board.
Chairman of the board of directors is the highest position on the BOD.
Link? Every source I have read today has reported gross margins declined at AMD for Q2.
OK, but practically speaking, what are the implications of that? How much power would he have in that role that could bring the company down even further, or prevent it from recovering? I'm not familiar with the organizational structure of shareholders/BOD's at publicly traded companies.
I just figured if his departure was due to the company's performance over the past couple years, he would have left entirely, where he would not have any power to influence decisions anymore.
- Sep 28, 2005
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http://money.cnn.com/2008/07/1...postversion=2008071717
"The executive changeover came as AMD reported that it lost $1.19 billion in the second quarter, worse than the $600 million it lost in the same period a year ago"
however:
"AMD's revenue rose to $1.35 billion from $1.31 billion, but it was short of the $1.45 billion in revenue expected on Wall Street."
Still AMD is in a lot of trouble.
All major shifts in the publicly stated strategies and agendas ("we make CPU's") as well as any major allocations of cash/assets ("we are buying ATI" or "we are spinning off Spansion") must be approved by the BOD.
Additionally all executive compensation packages are set by the BOD, as are the terminations.
Basically if Dirk wants to do anything revolutionary relative to the programs/agendas already set in motion by Ruiz he will have to seek out and secure Ruiz's approval as chairmen of the board.
In this manner Ruiz stands to continue his reign of ruinz by way of preventing or delaying changes that Dirk may want to institute. This is usually not something that occurs, and it is usually not something of concern (abuse of power) but Ruiz has shown he is by no means an ordinary individual...ergo there will be dialogue on this for many business quarters to come.
Ordinarily that might be true, but Hector's longevity at AMD proves he is in no ordinary situation there.
BassBomb
Diamond Member
- Nov 25, 2005
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That's a bargin just to get rid of Hector.
HP paid a ton more to get rid of Carly, and it was an even bigger bargin.
Regs
Lifer
- Aug 9, 2002
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I don't think you're giving the CEO enough credit. The CEO sets the organizational structure, middle management, supply chain, communications, strategic and short term goals and so fourth. Obviously, Ruiz would not of stepped down and hand it to Dirk if he thought Dirk would of been the better man for the job.
The chairmen's main duty is to lead the board of directors to a consensus for the good of the (majority) share holders and company. Maybe that's what you mean by how Ruiz can hinder Dirk, but Ruiz got enough problems trying to please the stock holders. Also remember large public corporations are highly scrutinized. You can't have conflicts of interest, and directors have to follow their fiduciary duty. Good faith as you will. Hector won't step in Dirks way. He is trying to do what he thinks is best for the company.
bryanW1995
Lifer
- May 22, 2007
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http://www.amd.com/us-en/Corpo...104_543~127059,00.html
Q2 08 GAAP Gross margin says 52%. Or am I reading this incorrectly?
Ah there is the disconnect, you are referring to GAAP Gross Margin which includes the profits from selling 200mm equipment which would be relevant were AMD going into the equipment resell business.
The rest of the investment community is interested in what AMD is calling "non-GAAP Gross Margin" which is in fact 37%. This is relevant as this indicates how AMD's core business (selling CPU's and GPU's) fared over the business quarter.
Check the fine print at the bottom of your link:
Thanks for the explanation. I've only dabbled a bit in reading financial info for companies so I still got a lot to learn.
Failure to expand AMD's penetration? Where do you get your number from? AMD got 20+% server market share at the peak with Opteron from almost nothing. I hate Ruiz as much as the next person, but I will give him credit he deserves. He is the head of AMD, so the buck stop at him, both good and bad time.
AMD stock down big time right right (over 10%) as I type this.
Hector "Ruinz" is not going anywhere. He's still on the Board and is believed to retain some day-to-day operation power. This is the problem with AMD. They are toooo loyal to failed leaders. When leaders failed, they should be disposed of. When a tree is dying, you don't try to save it with fertilizer; you just uproot it and plant in new seedlings.
Any "new CEO" who worked under "Hannibal Ruinz" will remain loyal to Ruinz, and I'm afraid it'll still be the same ole crew again. Hannibal will still be able to control the new CEO. AMD is almost the perfect example of a tech company with great ideas and products that did not execute well. But to be fair, it's not easy for any company to execute their business plan well when they're up against Intel.
AMD's financial situation right now is dire. I wonder how long it can sustain ifself. Morale at the company is at all-time low, and employees have been sending out resumes.
But I have to give credit to AMD for selling the 4850 for cheap. And wouldn't it now be ironic if the anti-competive lawsuit against it (and NV) be the straw that broke the camel's back though? And if AMD goes out, it will be because of Intel, not NV.
Hector "Ruinz" is not going anywhere. He's still on the Board and is believed to retain some day-to-day operation power. This is the problem with AMD. They are toooo loyal to failed leaders. When leaders failed, they should be disposed of. When a tree is dying, you don't try to save it with fertilizer; you just uproot it and plant in new seedlings.
Any "new CEO" who worked under "Hannibal Ruinz" will remain loyal to Ruinz, and I'm afraid it'll still be the same ole crew again. Hannibal will still be able to control the new CEO. AMD is almost the perfect example of a tech company with great ideas and products that did not execute well. But to be fair, it's not easy for any company to execute their business plan well when they're up against Intel.
AMD's financial situation right now is dire. I wonder how long it can sustain ifself. Morale at the company is at all-time low, and employees have been sending out resumes.
But I have to give credit to AMD for selling the 4850 for cheap. And wouldn't it now be ironic if the anti-competive lawsuit against it (and NV) be the straw that broke the camel's back though? And if AMD goes out, it will be because of Intel, not NV.
Right, it likely isn't that much of a change in AMD's leadership structure. It is, rather, an attempt to restore shareholder confidence by appointing a new person in the highest profile management position during troubled times. In other words, it's more about perception than reality.
- woolfe
- woolfe
Like I said in another thread here. There was a time where you couldn't buy an AMD PC from a store. Since Ruiz took over you have AMD tech in nearly every major brand despite Intel's partner incentives which are under investigation by 3 countries trade councils.
So say all you want about Ruiz. It doesn't make a bit of difference. Its time for someone else to pick up the slack. If you think running a company that competes with Intel is easy then you're an idiot. Looks to me he will get more executive delegation of power by moving to his new appointment and Meyer taking the reigns at CEO.
So say all you want about Ruiz. It doesn't make a bit of difference. Its time for someone else to pick up the slack. If you think running a company that competes with Intel is easy then you're an idiot. Looks to me he will get more executive delegation of power by moving to his new appointment and Meyer taking the reigns at CEO.
Whether or not Ruiz has been the real problem at AMD is questionable, but I do not think there is any doubt that the company could be doing better. Now whether that is the fault of the engineers and employees or the management, nobody outside of AMD is going to be able to tell you that.
Dirk said that AMD was falling short of its potential and that is certainly clear. The bottom line is that AMD has failed to continue innovating and launch new and competitive products. The last time AMD launched a product that was truly competitive was the Athlon 64 X2 in 2005, and that was just a dual core version of the A64 launched in 2003. If we look at single threaded performance, in the last 5 years AMD has made very little progress. Agena is only around 15-20% faster per clock than the old A64 that AMD launched in 2003 and has failed to reach higher clocks on a 65nm process than the A64 reached on 130nm. The top of the line Phenom 9950 today is only 15-20% faster in single threaded applications than the top of the line FX-55 launched 4 years ago.
How that happened is difficult for me to understand, but clearly somebody failed within AMD. As I said before, whether that is management or engineers, I cannot say. But it is management's job to lead the company and decide what direction to take, so they take the blame in these situations.
@ Extelleron,
I disagree with you a little. I think the most competive product for AMD was not the Athlon 64, but the original Athlon K7! As I recall, the K7 was in a class of its own, because the technology of the K7 was borrorwed from the then newly acquired DEC coporation, and DEC was at that point had good processor technology, better than Intel. And the K7 was kicking Intel's ass all over for 2 years! Yet AMD failed to capitalized on this. So you can't point the finger at the engineers, because AMD's engineers did give a great product. It's AMD management that failed. When you have a company losing money for the last 10 years, even when it has a good product, then you put the blame squarely on management. No question about it. I still remember AMD fanboys with their new K7 in hands,... berating Intel... calling for Intel's death.
And I suspect that unless the pricewar between AMD and NV ends soon, BOTH companies will be in a load of financial trouble, but if one goes, the first will be AMD. Intel is laughing this one off.
I disagree with you a little. I think the most competive product for AMD was not the Athlon 64, but the original Athlon K7! As I recall, the K7 was in a class of its own, because the technology of the K7 was borrorwed from the then newly acquired DEC coporation, and DEC was at that point had good processor technology, better than Intel. And the K7 was kicking Intel's ass all over for 2 years! Yet AMD failed to capitalized on this. So you can't point the finger at the engineers, because AMD's engineers did give a great product. It's AMD management that failed. When you have a company losing money for the last 10 years, even when it has a good product, then you put the blame squarely on management. No question about it. I still remember AMD fanboys with their new K7 in hands,... berating Intel... calling for Intel's death.
And I suspect that unless the pricewar between AMD and NV ends soon, BOTH companies will be in a load of financial trouble, but if one goes, the first will be AMD. Intel is laughing this one off.
K8 transformed AMD.
For one, it gave AMD a solid performance lead over Intel for the better part of three years. AMD had the undisputed performance lead in just about every workload from 2003 up until the launch of Conroe in July 2006 while using less power than equivalent Intel CPUs.
It gave AMD the reputation of a pioneer in the industry and not just a follower of Intel. AMD took really steps with K8; it was the first 64-bit desktop CPU and AMD64 has led the foundation for 64-bit computing on the desktop. It is the first modern desktop CPU to have an IMC as well, and abandons the FSB in favor of a fast interconnect, HyperTransport.
It established a lead for AMD in the server market, where AMD hadn't really competed with Intel before. Not only did the Opteron K8 CPUs destroy Netburst-based Xeons in performance like the A64 did to the P4, they also had much better scaling because of HyperTransport.
K8 CPUs were the first AMD CPUs to be accepted in the retail market as well. As you say, despite K7 beating PIII in performance, you did not see them in many PCs at all. You now see AMD CPUs in PCs all the time.
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